What Russo-American Relations COULD Have Been (with attached rant)

link.  link.

The above photos are especially sad for me.  It is not that I wanted the US and RF to go off fighting side by side in wars.  During the 1990s, I dreamt of the Russians reforming bit by bit and joining NATO, joining the European Union and becoming a partner in the West just as Germany has become.  However, there were warning signs in the 1990s this was not going to be.  

The strains of the Kosovo War would help push relations in the wrong direction.  The incident at the Pristina airport demonstrated there was going to be a problem.  Yet Another Damned Thing in the Balkans.  However, these were merely symptoms of the problem.  

Americans and Russians have a fundamental problem.  Russians need to be paid attention to.  Americans, unless its in their faces or has their interest at the time, tend to ignore things and people.  Politely put, the Russians feel they are important enough they need to have their interests higher than average and Americans feel they are too busy dealing with so much they can't pay attention to everything.  Put less politely, Russians are, culturally, arrogant, prideful attention whores and Americans are self-absorbed in chasing the next bright shiny with the attention span of a squirrel on meth.  Perhaps in a better way, when the Cold War ended, the Russians "said" great! Now we can rule the world together because we are not enemies anymore!  The Americans replied Great!  Now that we are not enemies, we can ignore you.

You have to wonder what would have happened had Clinton been willing to make Russia the center piece of his foreign policy.  Like his lack of pursuit of improvement of American infrastructure, utter failure in health care reform and how his administration's handling of terrorism and the Middle East, this was another missed opportunity.  The first (?) Clinton administration may end up being judged a lot harsher by history than we may.

Rant:

That said, what the administration of William Clinton will only be tangentially related to what a Hillary Clinton would do.  I utterly despise political dynasties and would vote against Jeb Bush for that reason alone.  Their father deserves a lot of respect. The Bush boys are far from their father's equal.  I intensely dislike the idea of another Clinton in office for the same reason.  However, its looking increasingly like I will probably be voting for Hillary.  The Republicans(1) are not offering a candidate who is addressing the fundamental problems this country is facing and Saunders has too much of a nativist streak for me.  So, Hillary...yeah.  No, it doesn't taste good to write that.

1. Where the frack the Eisenhower Republicans??? Or the Rooseveltian Republicans!  When your party of a CENTURY ago is more progressive then you're doing it wrong.